Chapter 267: 268: Lizard

Fresh lays sprawled out on the balcony, her limbs facing every which way as she basks in the midday sunlight for the remnants of her lunch-break. Pressing her tongue out of her mouth, she pulls it back inside a second later.

“Lizard,” says the girl quietly, to answer Basil’s question before closing her eyes again and taking in a deep breath of the hot, midday air.

“You really shouldn’t be laying on the floor,” says Basil. “We have perfectly good furniture.”

“Lizards don’t use furniture, Basil,” replies Fresh, not bothering to open her eyes. It’s so warm. Business is booming as always, but they split the counter up into two groups. Jubilee and Shamrock are running the store right now, while the two of them recover and then they’ll switch and let the others take half an hour too. It’s just something they’re trying out, to see if it makes the day go by easier.

Fresh has opted to use her lunch break not to eat or to drink, but rather to rest as would the greatest rester of all animals that she knows, the lizard.

Is there any creature more relaxed than a lizard, bathing in the sunlight on a nice, warm rock on the beach? She doesn’t think so and so, she emulates the creatures, hoping to draw from the innate, natural wisdom that she perceives them to have.

She presses her tongue out of her mouth again, simply for the sake of it. She isn’t quite able to reach her own eyes to wet them.

“Sure, but…”

“You could learn from the lizards too, Basil,” says Fresh, stretching her legs out and flopping over the other way. Sure, it’s not a rock. But the balcony itself is pretty nice too.

“But what if you get hungry later? You should eat.”

“I won’t!” says Fresh, not sure why she’s so confident about this statement.

Basil sighs. “I bet you will.”

“Nu uh!” replies Fresh, pressing herself up with her hands to look at the priestess. She blinks, lowering herself down again. Arguing is unlizardlike.

A chair scoots to the side as Basil sits down at the table on the balcony. “Jubilee is going to yell at you if you eat anything from the counter,” she warns. “You’ll have to wait until dinner-time then.”

“Okay!” agrees Fresh, closing her eyes and basking in the bright sunlight for the remainder of her break while Basil sits quietly at the table, eating a light sandwich and sipping her usual tea.

It’s a very relaxing half hour, but it eventually does come to an end and Fresh, feeling as energetic as ever, rises to her feet and stretches herself out tall. She almost expects her back to pop as she does so, but it doesn’t and she smiles a warm, satisfied smile towards Basil. “I’m ready! Wanna go downstairs?”

“Okay,” says the priestess and the two of them go on their way to relieve the other two.

The first thing that she sees when she gets downstairs and around to the counter is a gloved finger pointing at her. “About fucking time!”

“It was half an hour,” says Basil. “Food is on the table.”

Jubilee waves the priestess off, walking away and just leaving the counter unmanned, despite a customer standing there, ready to pay. Fresh yelps running over to replace Jubilee and to help the man with his purchase.

“Any trouble?” she asks, calling after Jubilee as she turns her head around to look at Shamrock. Ice-cream seems to be moving slower than usual today, judging by the still decently full containers.

“Nothing some delegation couldn’t fix,” says Jubilee before walking off and Fresh doesn’t really know what to interpret from that statement.

“Good job, Shamrock,” says Basil as she takes his spot. “I left you some food on the table upstairs.”

“Thanks,” says the giant man, nodding.

“Huh?” asks Fresh. “You didn’t make me any food, Basil.”

“I asked you three times!” argues the priestess, sighing. By the time she looks back to the window, a large line seems to have formed out of nowhere, as if everyone was just waiting for the intimidating man from the witch’s sect to leave.

(Fresh) sold: [Bracelet]{Red}{Green}{Green}

for

[{57} Obols] !

“Thank you, come again!” calls Fresh after the man as he leaves.

The day is fairly busy and Fresh finds herself running around far more than usual. At least for that half hour. With just the two of them down here, she has to work the counter and refill the empty shelves at the same time. Basil doesn’t really have the opportunity as the ice-cream window might as well be a portal to another dimension that is made entirely out of people. So, in the rare spare minute she finds, Fresh runs to the window to help Basil as well. It feels like everyone who was avoiding the window while Shamrock was here is now rushing towards it, having seen his replacement.

She feels a little sad for him honestly, it must have felt very lonely, standing here and getting mean looks the whole time.

Wiping her forehead on her sleeve, she runs back to the counter and begins tallying the amount that the next customer has to pay.

Though, now that she thinks about it, she supposes that she understands what that feels like, that was her entire life in the west, essentially. Though, now that she double-thinks about it, that must be what life is like for Shamrock all the time anyways. The west was the exception for him.

Her stomach growls.

Fresh turns her head, looking over at Basil who narrows her eyes at her as if to say ‘I told you so’, but she doesn’t have time to make a remark as she is just too busy.

After the others return, Fresh understands Jubilee’s prior snarkiness. The half-hour really felt like a lot longer. Two people is just too few for the size of their operation. Three of them needed to be here all the time to stop them from becoming overwhelmed.

Thankfully, after Jubilee gets back to run the counter and Shamrock takes over the shelves, Fresh runs to Basil’s rescue and does her best to help serve the ice-cream, fighting off every little bit of temptation to eat any of it herself.

It isn’t easy, by any means, but if there was ever a chance to prove her resolve to Basil, then it’s now. The universe has given her this moment to prove her worth and Fresh makes the best use of it that she can, not even sparing a second glance at any ice-cream or bags of crab-chips that make their way over the counter until eventually, the window closes and Fresh finds herself staring at it, wondering why there is nobody there.

A moment passes as she stares at the shutters until she realizes that the day is over.

Her stomach growls and she flops down to the ground, sitting on her bottom. Turning her head, she sees Basil has already beat her to it and has landed on the floor already.

“Like animals,” sighs Jubilee and for a moment, Fresh thinks that they mean the two of them. But after seeing them shaking their head which is still resting on the counter, she realizes that they meant the customers.

“It was a busy day today,” sighs Basil. “I don’t think the lunch-break idea will work.”

“No, it’s fucked,” says Jubilee, lifting their head up and pulling open the money drawer. “The half-hour of rest wasn’t worth the work.”

“Maybe only ever one person then?” suggests Basil. “Like we’ve been doing.”

“Mm,” nods Fresh in exhausted, but fervent agreement with her eyes closed. A crinkling sound of paper comes from next to her and she lifts her gaze, looking at Basil who is opening a bag of crab-chips.

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Feeling both her and Jubilee’s gaze on her, Basil laughs meekly. “I’m hungry.”

“It’s coming out of your pay!” barks Jubilee at her. Basil shrugs, holding the bag out to them.

“Crab-chip?” asks Basil. Fresh watches Jubilee’s eyebrow twitch beneath their mask as Shamrock rounds the corner, coming to the counter as well.

Jubilee sighs and takes off their mask. “Fine. But you’re still paying for it,” they say, taking a chip and sitting down as well. With her free hand, Basil pats the spot next to her and Shamrock sits down there. He seems tired too, which is a surprising sight for Fresh. His armor seems a little droopy now, as if he didn’t have the energy to stand straight anymore.

Basil tears the bag open wide and sets it down between the four of them.

“Should we be having snacks for dinner?” asks Fresh, taking another chip.

“Oh no, no,” says Basil. “We’ll be having dinner after this,” she explains.

“Ooooh,” says Fresh, realizing as she bites into the chip.

Jubilee shakes their head. “You’re cooking if you want anything. I’m out.”

“Same,” says Shamrock, his breastplate heaving.

Basil looks up at Fresh. “Uh…” stammers Fresh. In truth, she really wants to say no too. She’s exhausted and perfectly content with eating a load of garbage food like this before falling into bed. “I can help, Basil,” she relents, feeling her inner lizard die.

Seeing her delay, Basil sighs, getting up. She grabs a bucket of ice-cream from the counter and a load of spoons and sits back down, handing them each one.

“Dinner’s ready!” calls Basil enthusiastically.

“I thought you were supposed to be the responsible one?” asks Jubilee, taking their spoonful nonetheless.

Shamrock seems to brighten up as well as the instant he gets some food, he seems to be sitting straighter and taller once more.

Basil shakes her head. “I decided to be more like a lizard today,” she explains.

“What the fuck?” asks Jubilee, tilting their head.

“Lizard,” explains Basil with a single word, sticking out her tongue.

Fresh nods. “Lizard, Jubilee,” she says, doing the same thing.

“I ate a lizard,” says Shamrock. All three of them turn towards him. “When I was small,” he adds on.

“Must’ve been one big fucking lizard then,” sighs Jubilee, looking at him.

“It fought well.”

Jubilee looks down at the bag of chips and ice-cream laying before them and sighs, dropping their spoon. “Okay, you know what? Fuck it. I’ll cook,” they say, getting up and dusting their hands off. “You people are sad. I refuse to be a part of your lizard cult.”

“You’ll find your way to the faith eventually,” says Basil, getting up.

“The only thing I’m going to find is a fucking frying pan while you guys take care of this mess,” they say, pointing back at the pile of food on the floor.

“Thanks Jubilee!” calls Fresh after them. She looks back at Basil. “Lizard.”

“Lizard,” replies Basil.

The two of them look at Shamrock who stares at them, before getting up too.

“It didn’t taste good,” is all that he says and Fresh sighs in relief.

Razmatazz

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